Mr. Speaker, I am being heckled by an MP from Toronto about provincial politics. That shows just how seriously he takes how this place works right now.

He was elected on a commitment to make this place work better, but he stood earlier in this place and said it was about making sure the executive could pass its agenda. I hope his constituents will remember that his priority here is the executive passing its agenda, and not making sure that he has the ability, both in committee and in this place, to protect his privilege.

We are not just standing for our privilege. It is for the privilege of Liberal members as well, who have unfortunately, at least in this place, been silent on this. It would be interesting to be a fly on the wall during their caucus meetings and other meetings that they have.

Not only were many of them elected in the 2015 election for the first time, but many of them also ran for the first time. I have no doubt, as I said in my speech on Tuesday on this very issue, that many of them ran because the leader of their party, who is now the Prime Minister, said that we had been going through a horrendous 10 years with a dictator in Parliament, with Stephen Harper, who does not respect the way Parliament works, who tables omnibus legislation, oops, who got elected with 38% of the vote, a so-called majority, in a system that is unfair, oops, who decides that it is more important to make announcements outside of Parliament than in Parliament, in town halls, not doing them here, oops.

All these people ran because that person, the member for Papineau who is now the Prime Minister, the man from Papineau as my colleague from Skeena—Bulkley Valley called him, said that he would be better. He inspired literally over 100 people to run in politics, in some cases for the first time, who are here now. What does he do to thank them? He takes away their ability to participate in debate in this place and its committees. So much for real change.

The Liberal government was elected on the strength of its firm commitment to do things differently, to be different from the government of Stephen Harper and those of the other Liberal prime ministers, be it on the issue of access to Parliament Hill or invoking closure on debate and discussion, the advance distribution of the budget or a member taking photos in the House for publication on social media with negative comments about the opposition, which is simply fighting for its right to do its job, or Motion No. 6. The Prime Minister has often said he would do a better job.

The Liberal Party has to change.

He made that statement often during the last election campaign, and indeed, the Liberals have changed. Not only are they as bad as the others in some respects, but they are worse when it comes to safeguarding the importance of Parliament.

When we look at the proposed subamendments asking that the procedure and House affairs committee do better and make this issue a priority, I think that there are two things the government can do if it really believes protecting members’ privilege to be a priority. First, it can support the amendments moved by our Conservative colleagues and support the motion as a whole. In addition and above all, it can support the amendment moved by the Conservatives and guarantee that it will not go off on its own, whether on the issue of privilege or the committee's debate.

This must happen not for the members of the House, but for the people whom we represent. Personally, I want to be able to go door-to-door in my riding without every other citizen telling me that they wanted to get involved in politics because they believed in real change yet again, only to be treated with contempt and told that it was no big deal for the government to break its promises on electoral reform or on making Parliament work better.

This is why I am prepared to work with the Conservative Party, the Bloc Québécois, the Green Party, and also the Liberals. In the interest of democracy, all I ask of them is a guarantee they will engage with us and not impose their way unilaterally.

Adam VaughanLiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Families

Mr. Speaker, I love listening to the NDP talk about the concept of consensus. The New Democrats' concept of consensus is that first we agree to consensus and then others must do what they think is right, and if others do not agree to that, it is not consensus. I will tell members that where that philosophy falls down and becomes the most absurd is in this debate.

There is not one single member of Parliament who disagrees with the ruling and the observation that the privileges of the members who were stuck on the bus and could not vote were abridged. There is complete consensus, unanimous consensus, everyone agrees, and what happens? There is an endless debate afterward, not a resolution of the issue when consensus is reached. Consensus becomes the platform for endless debate, and that is a problem.

I appreciate that the process by which we attempted to bring a close to a unanimous position had a subsequent ruling, and that is what the debate on the floor of the House is today, but the notion that consensus is somehow going to magically unlock things in Parliament is absurd. We saw that during the electoral reform debate as well. The New Democrats said there had to be consensus, and then they did not budge from one idea that they held previous to the election on what that consensus must, not could, look like.

My question is on the notion of consensus and the goodwill to fellow parliamentarians. When is the NDP going to support the Bloc Québécois' call for official party status, the very same call the NDP made when their party did not quite meet the standard and was accommodated. Through the spirit of consensus and goodwill to all members, when is the NDP going to afford the Bloc Québécois official party status and let those members sit at committees and get equal rights, as all parliamentarians should; or is their talk just that: talk?

Mr. Speaker, if the member wants to talk about relevance, I think we had a great case study there.

When it comes to electoral reform debate, I want to address the comments of my colleague, although I know we are getting very much off topic. I will have him know that one of the key pieces in the report that was tabled by that committee was New Democrats—even though it was not the idea that was top of mind for us—looking to Conservatives who feel we need a referendum to move forward on this, and we were able to have that discussion.

I saw the members for Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie and Skeena—Bulkley Valley stand at a microphone outside this place and say we had decided that, in order to bring Conservatives onside, and hopefully other parties as well, because electoral reform is a critical issue for us and we are seeking that consensus, we were willing to live with a referendum if that is the path the government chooses to go down. What happened? The Prime Minister stood and said there is no consensus.

We did that work at committee, which flies completely in the face of what the member just asserted. That is what matters in these issues, whether it is electoral reform or the way this place works. We have our ideological differences. We might not be political mercenaries like Liberals can sometimes be, certainly in the Conservative Party and the New Democratic Party, but that being said, the key issue is that, when it comes to these fundamental changes, they have never been done without consensus. We will have fundamental agreements on other issues, but certainly we cannot have fundamental disagreements when it comes to changing the rules of how the heart of our democracy works.

Kevin LamoureuxLiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons

Mr. Speaker, I took some exception to the member's comments in regard to the Prime Minister and the change that was committed to Canadians. I would like to remind the member that with private members' bills we have free votes, unlike the New Democratic Party. We have even seen the government lose a number of those votes. We have seen committees where amendments were passed that opposition members proposed.

The member was here during the Harper administration, and that did not occur. I am wondering if the member could be forthright about how we have seen some positive changes and recognize that if the government of the day wants to make significant changes to modernize Parliament and if the combined opposition—the Conservatives and the NDP are united as one, it would appear, on this issue—does not want to reform the Parliament of Canada and modernize it, that could be a problem for the government. This is one of the reasons why we are struggling to make sure that we get that discussion going, but it would be irresponsible to give it a veto. Would the member not agree?

Mr. Speaker, I do not know where my colleague gets the idea that our votes are not free, for I can assure him that they are. I do not understand why he would question the fact that we are mature enough to have robust discussions and then arrive at a certain consensus.

This makes two questions in a row, from two parliamentary secretaries, two representatives of the executive, that have attempted to bring up the Bloc Québécois or the operation of the NDP, even though we are talking about the operation of Parliament.

The example given by the Liberals is interesting. They speak of free votes and say that the Liberal backbenchers have won votes in spite of the government’s position, but when Bill S-201 received the support of Liberal backbenchers, the justice minister referred it to the Supreme Court. Furthermore, the amendments to Bill C-22 that were supported by certain Liberal members on the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security are going to be reversed in the House.

It is all well and good, then, to say they have free votes and to congratulate themselves on that, but if the government can do an about-face on issues of fundamental importance such as medical assistance in dying and the committee of parliamentarians that will be overseeing national security agencies, then it is only smoke and mirrors. In any case, with the proposed changes, we may not even have to get up to vote any more. We will have remote voting or something.

I want to bring my Liberal colleagues back to the essential issue. To guarantee us that members’ privilege to represent their fellow citizens is properly defended, we ask for one simple thing: consensus.

Mr. Speaker, it is curious. My colleague mentioned the Liberals who were getting up to speak and those who were not. I have taken note of this. On this side of the House, I have the freedom to speak at any point I want, on any issue, and to ask questions of the government, of anyone sitting on the other side. It is clear to me that it is not the same in the Liberal caucus, that there are designated spokespersons within the party.

I have to wonder if the information is only being given to a certain circle of people within the Liberal Party. I have had a lot of conversations with my Liberal colleagues on this issue, on what we currently face at PROC. Either they vehemently disagree with it—they think it is wrong and that we should not be going down this path because they have been a member of Parliament and they understand the way things are done here and that we need consensus—or they do not know anything about it. They really do not understand. They think it is only about what is happening at PROC, or they think this question of privilege is something to tie up their time, to cause some kind of shenanigans over on this side of the House. They really do not have the information about this question of privilege and the subamendment to send it to the committee. It is clear to me that if they are not receiving the information, they are not able to make a good decision on behalf of the hundreds of thousands of people who have sent them here to perform that role.

Has this been my colleague's experience as well, that there are people on the Liberal side of the House who do not even understand what we are debating today?

Mr. Speaker, when we sought to understand who speaks on behalf of the government, all we got were more smoke and mirrors.

The government made another commitment with regard to the operation of Parliament, namely that there would be no more parliamentary secretaries on committees. The last time I checked, however, if only on the committee on which I sit, the parliamentary secretary was still there. He may be a little more laconic than the Conservative government's parliamentary secretaries used to be, but once again, that is because this is all smoke and mirrors.

They maintain that they are doing things differently, but I find that hard to believe when an assistant from the whip’s office and a parliamentary secretary sit on the committee. Even if they do not speak, I suspect that the spectre of the Prime Minister’s Office looms over the committee's Liberal members as they work.

I would like to come back to the comments by the hon. member for Malpeque which I quoted, to bring us back to the key point: this is the House of Commons, not the House of cabinet. When the opposition stands united, it is in defence of our rights, Liberals included. We are beginning to see that they realize this as well. In any case, they are welcome if they want to join us to ask the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and the Prime Minister to require consensus before changing anything at all in our democracy.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to take the floor today. I want to congratulate the hon. member for Beloeil—Chambly on his very fine speech. His bilingualism is second to none. There is no question that he honours the forefathers of the two founding peoples of Canada.

My colleague from Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan has quite clearly explained the matter that I am addressing today. He has provided a good history of the last three weeks, laying out each successive question of privilege. I do not intend to repeat that exercise. Although I plan to speak to the importance of a question of privilege in my introduction, my main intention is to analyze the discussion paper on House reforms, while remaining grounded in the subject at hand.

For three weeks I have been awaiting the opportunity to address my colleagues in the House on the debate before us, whether on the issue of privilege or the reforms debated in the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. Although some members are trying to differentiate the debates and separate their elements, they constitute a whole. Whether we are dealing with the question of privilege or the Liberal government's proposed reforms, which are meant to modernise Parliament, the issue remains the same, namely the inalienable rights of parliamentarians, and indirectly, every Canadian’s right to representation.

Over the last three weeks, I have tried to speak before the committee by getting my name on the list. I did not succeed. I also tried to speak in the House last Friday. I was here to take part in the debate, like my colleagues on the other side. I am happy to be able to speak at last, and perhaps bring a French Canadian perspective to this debate.

Many of my colleagues on this side of the House have tried to demonstrate that questions of privilege are of critical importance to members of the House of Commons as well as to the members of Westminster-style parliaments worldwide.

Questions of privilege have been centuries in the making. I think it was my hon. colleague from Yorkton—Melville who aptly explained how, centuries ago in England, kings attempted certain manoeuvres to prevent the lords or members of the bourgeoisie, who were elected members or senators at the time, lords of the upper chamber, from entering the House to vote in due course on a given bill.

Over the centuries, the respective English chambers acquired certain means of protection, the most important of which pertained to the issue of privilege which we are debating today.

The foremost purpose of the question of privilege is to ensure that access to this democratic precinct is never impaired by any particular situation, the behaviour of an individual, or laws or changes to House procedures and affairs. It is no small matter to say that the question of privilege took centuries to adequately protect.

Two weeks ago, two of my Conservative colleagues were unable to vote because they were delayed by a bus which had itself been delayed by the vehicles transporting our right honourable Prime Minister. The privilege of these two members here today to represent and speak on behalf of their constituents has, in effect, been breached, as has the privilege of all members. Every member of Parliament represents approximately 100,000 citizens.

This is a very serious issue for all members of the House, simply because of what could happen. Let us turn the tables. Imagine that this was a confidence vote and that some 30 or 40 Liberal members were unable to reach the House. The government could fall and an election could be called.

That is why we must ensure that access to the House is never restricted in any way. That is extremely important. That is why we should not hesitate to debate this for as long as we must. The breach of a parliamentary privilege could have disastrous consequences. This is a very serious matter.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, directly or indirectly, willingly or not, is trying to manage this debate on the question of privilege. Last Friday, I was here when he tried to manage the debate and call into question the pertinence of debating a question of privilege in the House. He also tried to do something like that today, in my humble analysis of the situation, context, and dynamics in the House. We can see that this is a habit of our Liberal government colleagues and the parliamentary secretary. It is the Liberal habit of wanting to manage, control, dominate, and supervise the elected members of this very honourable democratic chamber.

It would be useful to read the definition of the word “manage”. To manage means to administer. To administer what? According to the dictionary I am reading from, to manage means to administer the interests and affairs of another.

Only I can manage my interests in the House. I read the definition of the word “manage” so that we can refer to it when we read the discussion paper presented by the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons entitled Modernization of the Standing Orders of the House of Commons. I invite you to go to page 2, where it states:

Therefore, the themes of the proposed reforms are three-fold in addressing the aforementioned issues. They include: (1) the management of the House and its sittings; (2) management of debate; and (3) management of committees.

Management is the act of managing. I can hardly believe that none of the professionals in the government ever told the House leader not to put those words in the paper. Those words, along with several other words, do not belong there. I will talk about that later.

It is not up to the government to manage the House. The government manages affairs of state. It manages Canada. Fine. The government's job is to manage the interests of Canadians, not the House of Commons. Nevertheless, that is what it says here in the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons's paper on reforming the Standing Orders of the House of Commons.

The Canadian Constitution is my bible; I refer to it constantly, though I like the Bible too. If we look at the part about legislative powers, it talks about privileges. The word “privileges” is in the Canadian Constitution, right there in the British North America Act of 1867, but there is no mention of the word “manage” in the part about the House of Commons.

Of course, the Fathers of Confederation never planned, anticipated, or intended for the government or members to manage the House. On the contrary, emphasis is put on the question of privilege.

Let us look at what is happening with the government's proposed changes, which are in fact at the heart of the current debate, although we are now debating the subamendment to the question of privilege relating to issue of privilege. As I said, I will not get into the entire back story, as my colleague from Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan explained it all so very well.

In fact, the debate is on the opposition members' current frustration with a disingenuous attempt by the Liberal government and especially the Prime Minister to substantially and significantly reduce the right to speak, the right to vote, and the right of all hon. members to act as they see fit in the House. It is hard to see what the government hopes to achieve exactly. I do not wish to impugn their motives. I will leave it to everyone to come up with their own interpretation. However, one thing is clear, the government's discursive arguments are deeply flawed.

Many things bother me about the discussion paper on reforming the Standing Orders. On page one, we read that Parliament “should respond to demands of greater accountability, transparency and relevance“. The Fathers of Confederation, constitutional conventions, and parliamentary conventions have never been concerned with relevance. The only thing that is very much relevant to all members and all Canadians is the election that is now held every four years under the new law. The only thing that is very much relevant is the result of the election which then translates into the division of political powers in the House of Commons. The only matter of relevance in the House is the representation of citizens and the representation of the different interests and different political forces in Canadian society.

In the second paragraph, we read that the impetus of the reforms is “to balance the desire of the minority's right to be heard with the majority's duty to pass its legislative agenda.” That is incredible. For a political minority to be heard is more than just a desire; it is a right. I was shocked to read such a thing in a text produced by the Canadian government. Is this an essay by a student at Cégep or is it a government document? It is really hard to tell.

In the third paragraph, we read that debates need to be more effective so that they are reasonable in length. Good heavens. Today I will be speaking for 20 minutes, although most of the time, I have only 10 minutes to speak. That is already unreasonable, because that is not a long time.

In my office I have a book called Canada's Founding Debates. Our predecessors in the House used to speak for two, three, four, or five hours. They would talk all night. Now we speak for 10 or 20 minutes, and we are being told that that is unreasonable. I was shocked to read those things in a government document.

The document also indicates that it is time “to re-evaluate the role of members and examine ways to increase their influence in the legislative process.” It is not easy to move forward with these kinds of reforms. In that regard, I have two very simple solutions I would like propose to the government, and I say this in all seriousness.

I have two very simple solutions to propose to the government, and I am confident that they will have the support of the House. I, for one, would champion this my entire life. If the Liberals really want to return true legislative authority to all members of the House of Commons, two things need to happen. First of all, the Prime Minister's Office needs to go. It has only been around since the 1970s anyway. Before that time, many prime ministers were both prime minister and minister of foreign affairs. They were able to pull that off without the benefit of the PMO's 700 employees. I know what I am talking about, because I myself was an intern at the PMO, which has about 200 political staffers and 500 public servants.

Then, we need to put an end to party discipline. It does not exist in England, and that is the real Westminster parliamentary system. The concept of a majority and minority is actually an illusion. In a real Westminster parliamentary system where there is a majority and a minority, the majority is constantly changing, at every moment and for every vote. That is how it is in England.

A real prime minister, in the British parliamentary system, must have the pride, conviction, and strength to convince all members of the House of Commons to take his side. In England, David Cameron has lost I do not know how many votes. Sometimes 80 of his Conservative colleagues do not vote the same way he does, but he wins the vote anyway because some democratic liberals and members of the workers' party vote with him. That is the strength of a real parliamentary majority. It is always changing.

To give power back to members, all we need to do is close the Prime Minister's Office and put and end to party discipline. If he were to do so, the Prime Minister would be acting with incredible audacity and remembered for thousands of years to come.

On page 4, the government says that the reforms will provide a greater degree of flexibility, which will “calm the acrimonious proceedings leading up to the summer and winter adjournments.”

Once again, when a person knows how liberal constitutionalism works in a Westminster parliamentary system, acrimony is welcome. Our founding fathers wanted political acrimony. The United States uses a system of checks and balances because they have a strict, airtight division of power. Here the division of power is not strict or airtight. You know that better than I do, Mr. Speaker, since you have served in this great chamber for many years.

Acrimony provides checks and balances in the House. What is more, works written by political scientists Baker, Morton, and Knopff, from the University of Calgary, and Manfredi, from McGill University in Montreal, teach us that there is acrimony among the three powers, or in other words the executive, legislative, and judicial branches. That acrimony is what allows us to come up with the best solutions for Canadians following a strong and vigorous debate.

I want to emphasize that the government's reforms, which are at the root of the question of privilege we are talking about today, and which are the subject of two more questions of privilege, would take away our rights as opposition MPs. If the Liberals really want to give members more legislative power, all they have to do is get rid of the PMO, which would be great, and put an end to party discipline.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech, which was very interesting. He had some ideas.

We really want to work with people on both sides. We want to work together. It is good to listen to these ideas. That is how we find answers.

If I understand correctly, today we are talking about the fact that two MPs were unable to get here in time to vote. That is a question of privilege. Everyone knows that we have discussed the matter extensively for several days now.

Basically, what we have been talking about is the fact that we could have electronic systems for people to vote remotely. That is something we can do, and it could potentially prevent some of these problems from arising. My constituents really want us to talk about the work we have to do, about job creation, the environment, and many other things. They want us to talk about those issues.

Does the member think it would be more productive to talk about new ways of voting rather than keep talking about this issue here in the House?

I am glad she mentioned electronic voting. Although it might be the smallest proposed change in the discussion paper, I am strongly opposed to electronic voting. I am extremely proud to have to be present in the House. It is not a matter of personal pride. In fact, it is about acknowledging my 100,000 constituents. That is what the Westminster model is all about. That is why in England, the House still reflects the 18th-century House of Commons. It is a good thing.

I do not want us to be like the U.S. congress where there are big television screens, endless voting, and negotiations between representatives where one representative asks another to change their vote in exchange for the other representative's vote another time. No, we must rise with honour, acknowledge the person saying our name and that of our riding, and do so before all Canadians. It is important. Electronic voting promotes disengagement.

Mr. Speaker, my friend covered a lot of ground. I take much of what he has talked about as underscoring the difficulty the government has between understanding the difference between the executive, cabinet, and government and the rest of us who constitute Parliament.

Consistenly the Liberals seem to not only want to blur the lines but eliminate them, particularly in the case of control of security in here. Rather than it being under our collective control, it is now under the control of the Prime Minister diretly through the commissioner of the RCMP. That is totally unacceptable. At some point, we will get our Parliament back.

Given the mounting evidence that the government clearly does not know, or it does not understand, the important distinction between members of the executive council called cabinet versus the rest of us, and collectively we constitute Parliament, does my colleague share my feeling that in large part the government, the cabinet, sees the rest of us, especially those of us on the opposition benches, as a nuisance, as a minor irritant to get around rather than respect? That is my impression. Would the member share that viewpoint?

Not only is what he just said true, but, moreover, the government does not understand its role in the House of Commons. This document is peppered with words that should not be there. We see words that do not reflect the expectation, according to the Constitution and the British North America Act, for the House of Commons. The duty of the government is to manage the state and Canadians. We have to wonder about that too.

The role of the government is to manage the affairs of the state, not to manage the House of Commons. This document was written by a student.

Kevin LamoureuxLiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons

Mr. Speaker, in good part I have really enjoyed a lot of the dialogue and listening to comments across the way. I cannot help but desire to see something happen within the procedure and House affairs committee. The member made reference to a lot of rules by talking about the discussion paper and that is what the government House leader was attempting to do, to bring it to PROC so that the committee would be able to get the type of debate and discussion about the pros and cons of the rules that are being suggested.

The member made a reflection in terms of the mother Parliament in England. I know the member has gone through the document and he has made reference to it throughout his speech. I wonder if he finds that there is anything within that document that would go against the mother Parliament. It seems to me that it is a good discussion paper and many of the things within the discussion paper are in fact quite often reflected within the mother Parliament. Would the member not agree that would have been a very good discussion point in itself at PROC?

Mr. Speaker, on the contrary, what I see in this discussion paper is an attempt to slowly but surely lead Canada toward a republican system. We would no longer have a Westminster system, but rather an executive that does whatever it wants, that is not accountable to anyone, and that is not responsible for its actions. That is why I do not like republics. I like the Westminster system, where the government is held to account every day.

Mr. Speaker, I want to remind our hon. colleague across the floor that the government House leader chose to have a discussion with the rest of the House, but she chose to do it through the media rather than having a respectful conversation. Really the discussion for the last three weeks has been on parliamentary privilege, and that is what we are talking about today. I want to remind folks that on page 61 of O'Brien and Bosc, it states:

The privileges of Members of the House of Commons provide the absolute immunity they require to perform their parliamentary work—

—for their electors.

It goes on to state:

The privileges of the Commons are designed to safeguard the rights of each and every elector. For example, the privilege of freedom of speech is secured to Members not for their personal benefit, but to—

—be the voice of electors.

Essentially, what the government is doing is silencing the opposition. It is sending the message that all of the opposition and all of the electors that elected the opposition members, whether they are Conservative, NDP, Bloc, or Green, do not have a say.

Does my hon. colleague not agree that essentially what the Liberals are saying is that all of the electors in the ridings of the opposition members should not have a say and that their points do not really count?

Mr. Speaker, what the Liberals want is to make sure that Canadians have less of a voice in the House. Since the constitutional revolution of 1982, led by Pierre Elliott Trudeau, the Liberal Party has been trying to do away with the Westminster system. The Liberal Party's ultimate goal is to bring a republican system to Canada. I will never stand for that. We blocked this reform paper before it went to committee to ensure that these proposals will never be passed.